It was a heartfelt goodbye from the king of British pop to the king of British shopping, one scouser to another.

Liverpool's most famous son, Sir Paul McCartney, helped Tesco wave goodbye to Sir Terry Leahy in a video tribute played at his leaving do this month.

Leahy will head for the checkout on Monday after 14 years at the top of a business he helped turn into one of Britain's biggest success stories with sales of nearly £62bn.

Among the other (business) celebrities paying tribute to the executive, who worked at Tesco for 32 years, was Unilever boss Paul Polman while another fan is former Asda chief executive Allan Leighton, who is recognised as a kingmaker in the grocery sector.

"I am a big admirer of his, he is a unique character," said Leighton. "In my view Tesco is the best food retailer in the world. Ian MacLaurin [Leahy's predecessor] made it the best in the UK but Terry made it the best food retailer in the world."

Leahy is handing in his pass for Tesco House, its Soviet-style breeze block head office on a grim industrial estate in Cheshunt, on his 55th birthday. His decision to go surprised the City as his pension pot does not start paying out for another three years while the grocer's attempt to crack America with the Fresh & Easy chain is still unproven and not expected to break even until the financial year 2012/13.

When he took over from Lord MacLaurin in 1997 Tesco had overtaken Sainsbury's in Britain. Analysts were unsure whether the new boss would keep up the momentum and Tesco was yet to match its more upmarket rival's profitability. It is safe to say that such doubts no longer exist.

Today Sainsbury's is Britain's number three, with profits of £660m expected this year and 16.6% of the market. Tesco speaks for 30.5% of UK grocery sales and is expected to deliver profits of £3.7bn at its annual results in April.

The extent of Tesco's success under his leadership is spelled out by the statistic that more than £1 out of every £7 spent on the high street goes through Terry's tills. Half its 5,000 stores are now overseas with flags planted in 13 countries from Poland to China. South Korea is its largest market outside the UK. Sainsbury's chief executive Justin King said: "Tesco's domestic success was entrenched when Terry took over, his legacy is that it is now the third largest retailer in the world. It is a true British success story."

Leahy, who joined the grocer when he was 23, was Tesco's first marketing director and he is credited with steering the success of its Clubcard loyalty card scheme in partnership with data mining firm Dunnhumby. Today one in two UK households has a card and with the click of a mouse Tesco can profile you faster than the FBI. From your shopping list it can tell whether you are single and living on ready meals or a family juggling a tight budget; clues that enable Tesco to put the right products in the right stores and target you with promotions you will respond to.

Clubcard points can be redeemed at Tesco, as well as a range of partner retailers, including restaurants, hotels, travel companies "Nobody has been able to emulate Clubcard," says Leighton.

On Leahy's watch, Tesco's supermarkets shrank into convenience stores but also ballooned into the out-of-town Extras that are more like department stores, selling everything from groceries to washing machines and sofas and building a £1bn clothing business. He was one of the first to see the potential of the internet for selling groceries and built the first online home delivery business. It is, he claims, still the only profitable one.

He also masterminded the Finest premium food label, which helped transform what was regarded as a downmarket business into a classless one.

While Leahy is lauded in the City for his business nous, he has regularly received flak from other groups who complain that it has abused it dominant position – it has a market share twice that of its closest rival – in UK retail.

"Sir Terry Leahy may have helped line the pockets of Tesco shareholders, but the chain's aggressive expansion has had a damaging effect on British farmers, local communities and the environment," said Friends of the Earth's Helen Rimmer. "Tesco stores are popping up on street corners everywhere – putting local firms out of business and taking choice away from shoppers."

But Leahy – who grew up in a pre-fab maisonette on a council estate and is married to a GP – presents himself as an "everyman" and argues the grocer's critics do not live in the real world.

Tesco had 568 UK stores when he took charge and 2,482 when he announced he was going, and throughout four competition inquiries insisted its growth had been good for consumers.

Andrew Simms, author of Tescopoly, is not convinced: "Under Leahy's leadership Tesco has lost the argument, but through a combination of regulatory and political capture has won the economic war. Tesco is like the M25, nobody really likes it but they use it because it is a dominant piece of the infrastructure."

People who have worked with Leahy over the years say he is smart and hard-working but few would describe him as likeable with "inscrutable", "stubborn" and "single-minded" among the adjectives used. He is said to demand and receive loyalty, telling one interviewer: "I'm quite loyal. One religion, one football team, one wife, one firm." In case there is any doubt the team is Everton and the firm is Tesco.

His dour demeanour is often seen as a by-product of his determination to succeed. The third of four brothers, he was the only one to get a higher education, earning a degree from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology. He is listed among the institution's "distinguished alumni" with Margaret Beckett, Ben Elton and Anna Ford.

Leahy, a keen skier, who is not expected to retire to the golf course just yet, was in Davos last month to bang the drum for sustainable consumption, arguing businesses have to adapt to meet the growing demands of consumers in emerging markets. "The two billion consumers in China and India want to have the standard of living that consumers have in the US and western Europe and politically there is nothing we are going to be able to do to stop them," he said. "The only way out is to create new supply chains that are sustainable." He pointed to the need for more recycling, as well as new methods of low-carbon building and transport.

Leahy, who is handing over the keys to his empire to another Liverpudlian, Philip Clarke, says life after Tesco could include working in Asia: "I will be doing some private investment, taking some big shares in small companies. These will be in the UK and Asia, and possibly the US." However he added: "I am not going to have a job like the one at Tesco."